Today May 17th, the group traveled to downtown Charlotte Amalie to work with Habitat for Humanity. We were in the more local area of the city away from the tourists shops and attractions. We arrived at Blanche Cid's house. It was a nice home that had been a little worn down and needed some repairing. We were greeted by the Habitat for Humanity volunteer Executive Director , Sarah, and she read to us the safety precautions and we signed the liability waivers. Professor Taylor had bought new gloves that we were also donating to the organization and later donated additional tools to the organization. Sarah instructed us that we would be fixing the screens and handles on Ms. Cid's windows because the mosquitoes were preventing her from opening the window for a fresh breeze. Our initial reaction was that this would be a simple task, but we were wrong. The structure for the windows were completely foreign to us and the materials Sarah had provided us were of no use. So, we had to use the tools that we had to fix the screens and handles. We split up into groups so we could cover the different windows in the house. It was very frustrating that not all our techniques were successful. Finally, we were able to develop different systems for the different sets of windows because they were all differently and poorly designed. Our site leader Sarah had to go back to the hardware store and get the right materials but was able to make the purchase thanks to our Professor Dorceta Taylor. We were frustrated a few times while working on Ms. Cid's home but Ms. Cid's positive attitude made it worth it. She was 99 years old and made a strong effort to speak with everyone and was delighted and thankful that we were working so hard to help her. We talked to her and her care taker to get to know them more personally. She reminded a few of us of our own grandparents and how appreciative we would be if a group of young people helped our grandparents the way we helped Ms. Cid. In the end we felt extremely accomplished in our efforts to help Ms. Cid and that she is able to enjoy living in her home with the cool island breeze... and no mosquitoes!
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